Jurisdiction – right of a court to consider a particular course
Ex. local traffic courts → jurisdiction over speeding tickets but not for drugs
Article III of Constitution gives 2 types of jurisdiction to federal courts:
Federal jurisdiction – cases involving constitution, federal laws, cases where gov is a party…
Any law can be challenged in Supreme Court even if it started in state court
Diversity jurisdiction – fed court can hear case if it involves $75,000 and two states on opposing sides
Back then, concern that state courts would be biased against other state citizens
Cases with ppl from diff states can be tried in fed court instead IF stakes were high enough
Now $75,000 but amt based on claims made by plaintiff (complainer)
Defendant can’t decide amt, but can ask fed court to hear a case filed in state court
Appellate and Original Jurisdiction
Diff set of jurisdiction rules for Supreme Court – can decide which cases to hear
Has 2 types of fed jurisdiction: appellate and original
Appellate jurisdiction – cases appealed to Supreme Court from lower fed court or form state supreme court
Most cases from here
Congress can alter appellate jurisdiction of fed courts
Original jurisdiction – cases first in Supreme Court rather than in lower court
Ex. ambassadors of other countries
Ex. disputes between states over boundaries, etc
Only supreme court has both appellate and original
Structure of the Lower Federal Courts
District Courts
District courts → circuit courts → supreme court
District courts – most cases in fed system are heard
Trial courts: hear evidence and determine facts
Heard by 1 judge
Multiple in a state, doesn’t cross state boundaries
Circuit Courts
After case is heard in fed district courts → can appeal to fed circuit
Circuit courts – 13 intermediate appellate courts in fed system
Must hear appeal from district courts
Heard by 3 judges
Judges randomly chosen
Only hears cases looking for mistakes of law, not re-establishing facts of a case
Covers multiple states = multiple district courts
Supreme Court
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# of judges not specified in Constitution (now 9)
FDR tried to increase 9→15; Congress struck down
Court Packing Plan – add more judges to make passing laws more favorable
Selecting Cases in the Supreme Court
Court has discretionary docket – can decide what case to hear (usually only hears 80-90 cases)
Decides what to hear using Rule of Four
if 4/9 justices agree to hear a case
4 not a majority = minority is not oppressed
Hears only most imp cases
when lower fed courts have diff outcomes in similar cases
From rec of solicitor general – member of exec branch tasked with rep interests of fed gov before Court
Procedure in the Supreme Court
Writ of certiorari – when Supreme Court decides to hear a case, they order lower court to send up record of case
Aka hearing on the merits: starts with briefing by parties in the case
Legal brief – written argument favoring one side or other
Amicus curiae briefs – third party brief to give Court with extra info
Usually briefs favor one side more
Oral arguments after briefing is done
Lawyers have 30 min each to present case in person
Justices interrupt argument often
Conference after arguments
Justices give initial vote for petitioner (party who lost in lower court) or respondent (party who won in lower level)
Vote intentions announced in order of least to most senior
Chief justice goes last (apted by pres)
Seniority based on time of appointment
Order is imp bc chief justice can switch their vote to make a majority → gives them power to assign opinion writing task to themselves or justice of choosing
After opinion is written → justices make comments on draft opinion
Author makes changes to hold together a majority
Dissenting opinion – separate opinion written by justice
By group who disagree with majority coalition
Justice can also write concurring opinion – agree with outcome but not reason for conclusion
Selecting Federal Judges
Fed judges have life tenure – serve for life under Article III of Constitution
Except for Article I Congress chosen judges
Serve until they retire, die or impeached
Meant to insulate def judges from political pressure
Pres consults with senators from given state on who they want on court
Ex. for district court in SoCal, consult California senators but more likely to listen to those in the same party
Most apartment decisions affected by pres’ preferences
Those who share similar ideologies
Lots of conflict over Supreme Court aptments
ex) nominee Robert Bork, 1987 by Reagan
Rejected by Senate after liberal interest groups campaigned against him bc of views on civil rights and abortion
New term: to bork a nominee – defeat using public opinion
Judicial Decision Making
Three theories on judicial decision making
Model only describes approach used, not that a judge consciously chose it
Decisions v context dependent
Policy Preferences Model
Policy preferences – preferred outcomes in cases of judges with ideological learnings
Liberal, conservative
Primary goal of judge – to get their policy preferences made into policy
Conflicts with legal model
Q’s from the model
Does the law pose constraints on use of preferences
Is it appropriate to use their own preferences for decisions
Can institutional rules impose constraints on use of preferences
Policy preferences model applies most strongly at Supreme Court bc…
Judges choose case they hear
Cases where law is ambiguous → law unlikely to constrain justices’ preference decision
No review of Supreme Court decision by another court
Model weakens father down the hierarchy
Circuit courts – constraint by law that favors one side (90%)
Non-law constraint (10%): decision can be reviewed by Supreme Court → decision does’t match with S Court, Court can reverse decision
District courts – same 2 constraints as above, but more (99%)
Both circuit and S Court can review
Strategic Model
Strategic model – goal for judges is to use their policy preferences to guide their decisions
Judges also think abt other actors when making their policy preferences policy
Ex. chief justice votes against preferences to control who writes an opinion → second-best choice to give up a liberal outcome to stop a strongly conservative one for a less conservative one
Happens when…
Judges think ahead on reactions
Supreme Court: must be strategic bc need to build coalition to pass something
Strategic in selection of cases
Also considered how other branches of fed gov will react
Might alter choice to not anger Congress or pres
Congress can strip Court of jurisdiction
Ex Parte McCardle – Congress took away jurisdiction to stop court from reaching a decision that’s against Congress’ interests
Also explains a lot of circuit court (but not as much as Supreme Court)
Circuit court considers how other 2 judges would rule
Might consider review and reversal of decisions by Supreme Court
Reversals: damages reputation of circuit court judge
Opposing opinion from fellow judge increases chance of review by Court
District court – less avenues for strategic decision making
Decide cases by themselves
Can be reviewed by circuit court BUT most district court decisions are affirmed
Bc decided by law (straightforward)
The Legal Model
Legal model – decision based on law
Precedent
Plain meaning/txt
Lawmaker intent
Precedent – decisions made in similar cases should control decision in current case
Used in both fed and state legal systems
Mismatch → judge can dismiss precedent they don’t like for their own preferences
Plain meaning – laws must be read carefully to understand meaning
Language can be ambiguous → room for judges to inject preferences
Lawmaker intent – interpret law based on lawmaker’s intent when writing that law
Not always clear, not v clear if it should control interpretation of law
How much does it constrain the use of preferences in decision making?
S Court: not much bc justices choose cases where law is ambiguous
Law matters more in lower levels
More constraining for circuit and district → can’t choose legally ambiguous cases